Gaming & Culture —

Good riddance: Halo 4 creators threaten permabans for sexist comments

"Tits or GTFO?" After you, sir.

Halo 4 players who make sexist or discriminatory comments while playing the game on Xbox Live will receive a lifetime ban as punishment, according to an interview with the game's creators on Gamespot. While discrimination has always been frowned upon and punishable by temporary or permanent bans from the service, the creators behind Halo 4 seem determined to squelch this kind of harassment with a zero-tolerance policy.

"This is behavior that is offensive and completely unacceptable. I'd like to think most of our Xbox Live players don't support this kind of behavior," said Bonnie Ross, the head of Halo 4 developer 343 Industries, in her interview with Gamespot. Kiki Wolfkill, executive producer of Halo 4, added that a "broadcast mechanism" like Xbox Live can be a dangerous gift to adolescents, especially in the seeming vacuum of supervision that is a multiplayer game or lobby.

The Xbox Live Code of Conduct generally condemns harassment between players, either in speech or the content they create. But sexism is not specifically mentioned anywhere in the text. "Racial, ethnic, and religious slurs," are forbidden, as is "content of a sexual nature" and "hate speech," but sexism—attacks based on gender—are not explicitly mentioned.

That's not to say such attacks haven't been punished in the past on Xbox Live. Not only are players able to report each other for these offenses, but the service is also monitored by "enforcers" who will sit in on games in progress and watch for trouble. Enforcers also review logs for problems and then confront offending players with the evidence of their misdeeds. But the increased, public focus on preventing sexist harassment by two of the women behind Halo 4 is a promising step, and one we feel is completely necessary.

Sexism is a well-established issue within the gaming community—particularly in online games. But even as it's been widely acknowledged and condemned, it persists. Plenty of gamers continue to express troglodytic sentiments against women while playing, seemingly without the slightest inkling of how glaringly offensive they are. To cite just one example, in February, a male pro gamer made headlines by repeatedly sexually harassing a female teammate of his on a live video stream during an event, trying to guess her bra size and voicing a desire to spy on her in the women's bathroom.

At this point, this kind of talk is part of a script trotted out by sexist gamers the instant a woman appears, particularly in a voice-chat medium like Xbox Live (some more choice topics: kitchens, sandwiches, pics). When I play online, I often choose to stay muted rather than let fellow players hear my voice. Hearing a woman's voice doesn't always, or even often, draw attention in online games. But I decided a long time ago I'd rather not risk even the small possibility that my speaking up would draw out the same predictable, sexist, vitriolic saws. I decided the only way to win was not to play. Or to play, but not to talk.

Playing silently online is hands down less fun than when I can speak up, as when I'm playing with friends. But playing on mute is still better than taking the chance that I'm opening myself up to a roomful of players for whom a woman's voice is a trigger to spout off the same repulsive, sexist garbage lines I've already heard ten thousand times. This kind of harassment isn't only obnoxious, it's distracting. If the offensive stuff doesn't turn into a pile-on, it tends to generate defensive rants from all sides on free speech, white-knighting, and relative skill levels at hand. I just want to play my game.

The threat of a lifetime ban on an account won't stop the most persistent of trolls, especially since the policy will be impossible to enforce perfectly. But in a community where sexism is still, for too many people, the default response to a woman in the room, a harsh punishment will hopefully serve as the right wake-up call.

Casey Johnston
Casey Johnston is the former Culture Editor at Ars Technica, and now does the occasional freelance story. She graduated from Columbia University with a degree in Applied Physics. Twitter@caseyjohnston

I'm more interested to see how exactly they implement this. I could easily see people abusing this system to get innocent people banned from xbox live, at the cost of $120 (the cost of Halo 4 and the cost of a year of live service, presumably).

At the least, Microsoft should have to refund the xbox live money in any case. If you're going to deny someone the service they paid you for, you better refund the money they paid for it, especially if your 'proof' that they violated the contract terms consists of little more than the claim it happened.

I also thought that xbox live allowed selective muting of other players. Does it not do that?

My xbox collection consists of Dora Dance and other kids games, so frankly I don't know and I haven't bothered to activate live.

Oh my, anyone who's played an intense multiplayer will bare witness to a totally unbridled on slaught of abuse, you could be all the same sex, same race, live on the same street and every beratement will be thrown at you if things arnt going the other persons way.

I don't agree with it, but blood runs hot in e-sports. I'm a DOTA player and my skin has become as thick as Diablo's Barbarians. You just take it with a pinch of salt you're gonna get an ear full. Sometimes you can beat them at their own game and they will lament, but I think dishing out bans is either gonna work or end in tears for competitive numbers on the servers.

Aside from the moral standing of sexism and other discriminatory remarks, there is some argument to recognise some genius humour in their remarks. Especially when you hear it from those boys in the deep south, I never find that abusive only so distracting that I'm splitting my sides with laughter.

And Casey, you'd only get the most gentlemanly conduct in any game we might share

It's not perfect, but I'm glad to see some steps towards this. I'm sure the problem is more frequent in games like Call of Duty and Halo, but even in games like Left 4 Dead 2, the women I play with are being verbally assaulted just for existing.

Oh my, anyone who's played an intense multiplayer will bare witness to a totally unbridled on slaught of abuse, you could be all the same sex, same race, live on the same street and every beratement will be thrown at you if things arnt going the other persons way.

there's a huge difference between shit-talking your buddies and spouting utterly reprehensible garbage at someone you've never met before simply because they're a woman, or they have a speech impediment, or their name makes a reference to their being gay, etc.

My girlfriend has experienced this a few times, we feel it's a great way to weed out people we don't want to play with. Xbox live gives you the ability to mark people that you don't want to play with and it seems to work well for us.

Oh my, anyone who's played an intense multiplayer will bare witness to a totally unbridled on slaught of abuse, you could be all the same sex, same race, live on the same street and every beratement will be thrown at you if things arnt going the other persons way.

Casey is on the receiving end of a lot of comments on Ars about her fingernails, her gender, her relative hotness, and so on. Her tolerance is clearly pretty high when it comes to sexist remarks.

On the one hand, I'm strongly in favor of taking action against sexism (and other forms of harassment).

On the other hand, I'm not sold on handing out perma-bans for a first offense. I'd be more comfortable with an initial "shorter-term" ban or two (up to a maximum of a year or so), and then a perma-ban for a second (or third) offense. Some people will make mistakes while being kids (I'm not claiming that this is an excuse - ban them, but not for life! (the first time)), and if they're given a second chance they can in some (but not all) cases learn how to behave.

(If sexist comments *can* result in lifetime bans but don't *necessarily* do so I have no issue with the policy, but the first line of the article states "players who make sexist or discriminatory comments while playing the game on Xbox Live will receive a lifetime ban as punishment".)

I can see players grabbing voice changers, posing as women and trolling games to provoke a response for reporting, possibly a new form of griefing.

And I can already see the inevitable blog posts and controversies about "enforcers" discriminating in how they treat sexism against both genders, like a homophobic woman successfully having a gay man banned for life after an ingame argument.

Is a separate team of "enforcers" so necessary that this can't be handled as other offenses? Does the lifetime ban imply that racial/sexual discrimination (temp ban) isn't as important of an offense?

The arbitrary rulings of Political Correctness can get so tangled that it eventually becomes harder and harder to try to understand it from a logical or objective perspective.

I'm more interested to see how exactly they implement this. I could easily see people abusing this system to get innocent people banned from xbox live, at the cost of $120 (the cost of Halo 4 and the cost of a year of live service, presumably).

At the least, Microsoft should have to refund the xbox live money in any case. If you're going to deny someone the service they paid you for, you better refund the money they paid for it, especially if your 'proof' that they violated the contract terms consists of little more than the claim it happened.

To my knowledge, bans (temp or perm) on Live have never occurred solely due to claims made by others. It's either in combination with other ToS violations (such as similarly offensive user profile information), or they have actual employees who will go into games to verify the behavior. It's not hard. If you're a raging asshat one night, you'll probably be one the next.

Quote:

I also thought that xbox live allowed selective muting of other players. Does it not do that?

It does, but that doesn't fix the problem. I shouldn't have to explain why.

AnejoDave wrote:

can they really review the audio exchanged in a match to determine if I'm being truthful with my complaint?

That would be awesome if they can, and more awesome if they actually do.

here's hoping that this policy is strictly defined and enforced.

Good call, folks.

To my knowledge the audio isn't stored, so no. But like I said, the general process is to verify the behavior by catching you doing it again. They have algorithms to help sort through reports and decide who to actually "check in on" as well (to better utilize limited resources).

Unfortunately, I don't think they make a banhammer big enough to truly eliminate the problem.

Quote:

This kind of harassment isn't only obnoxious, it's distracting. If the offensive stuff doesn't turn into a pile-on, it tends to generate defensive rants from all sides on free speech, white-knighting, and relative skill levels at hand. I just want to play my game.

This, to me, is the best point Casey makes. Once the crap starts, even if the community response as it "should," there's really no happy ending. It can put a damper on the whole match, or night. Which is why you have to start actually keeping the riff-raff out.

How in the world will they implement this? As far as I'm aware, the options for reporting misconduct on XBL are very vague. You certainly can't record someone saying something and email it to the admins, so it makes me wonder how they will implement this policy.

On the one hand, I'm strongly in favor of taking action against sexism (and other forms of harassment).

On the other hand, I'm not sold on handing out perma-bans for a first offense. I'd be more comfortable with an initial "shorter-term" ban or two (up to a maximum of a year or so), and then a perma-ban for a second (or third) offense. Some people will make mistakes while being kids (I'm not claiming that this is an excuse - ban them, but not for life! (the first time)), and if they're given a second chance they can in some (but not all) cases learn how to behave.

(If sexist comments *can* result in lifetime bans but don't *necessarily* do so I have no issue with the policy, but the first line of the article states "players who make sexist or discriminatory comments while playing the game on Xbox Live will receive a lifetime ban as punishment".)

Eh

For one thing, we're not talking about depriving someone of any fundamental right, so the bar for number of allowed false positives is lower than, say, for a criminal trial.

For another, a permaban is really just a financial penalty. Worst case scenario, you can buy another console, get another free webmail account, and set up a new XBL account - and that's only if they ban the hardware, not the account (which seems unlikely).

It's not perfect, but I'm glad to see some steps towards this. I'm sure the problem is more frequent in games like Call of Duty and Halo, but even in games like Left 4 Dead 2, the women I play with are being verbally assaulted just for existing.

It doesn't even matter what game. I recall at an XBL panel with some of the enforcement folks, they made it clear that they actually have to deal with complaints from freaking Uno games. Jerks will be jerks, and they play everything.

I'm completely okay with this actually. XBox Live is Microsoft's turf, and if these are the rules, play and shut up, or never play again. It isn't like XBox is saying trash talking isn't allowed, just keep it reasonable.

Just like in the good old days when games like Quake were networked in a computer lab at your college or university. We all had to be fairly respectful because we all sat in the same room. Mouth off the wrong way, you'd get smacked.

Those were the good old days though! And the best reason to become good friends with the kids in CS classes - they usually had the keys to the lab. We used to play games well into the early AM because of that... who needs to complete homework?!

Oh my, anyone who's played an intense multiplayer will bare witness to a totally unbridled on slaught of abuse, you could be all the same sex, same race, live on the same street and every beratement will be thrown at you if things arnt going the other persons way.

Casey is in the receiving end of a lot of comments on Ars about her fingernails, her gender, her relative hotness, and so on. Her tolerance is clearly pretty high when it comes to sexist remarks.

Indeed. Such casual misogyny is unacceptable anywhere and for any reason. Casey is a fantastic journalist and manages to stay professional despite such behavior directed at her. Thanks for the well written article, Casey.

I can see players grabbing voice changers, posing as women and trolling games to provoke a response for reporting, possibly a new form of griefing.

And I can already see the inevitable blog posts and controversies about "enforcers" discriminating in how they treat sexism against both genders, like a homophobic woman successfully having a gay man banned for life after an ingame argument.

Is a separate team of "enforcers" so necessary that this can't be handled as other offenses? Does the lifetime ban imply that racial/sexual discrimination (temp ban) isn't as important of an offense?

The arbitrary rulings of Political Correctness can get so tangled that it eventually becomes harder and harder to try to understand it from a logical or objective perspective.

How about taking all that energy you spent on thinking of ways that online gaming could go wrong and focusing it on fixing what is currently wrong?

Casey is in the receiving end of a lot of comments on Ars about her fingernails, her gender, her relative hotness, and so on. Her tolerance is clearly pretty high when it comes to sexist remarks.

\

So I guess in order to eliminate sexism we need to get rid of fingernails, attractiveness, and gender.

In essence I am sure we largely agree and I have no doubt that Ms. Johnston has had to suffer the abuse of many basement dwelling misogynists. But recognizing that Casey is an attractive woman can be done in a tasteful manner that I wouldn't call sexist.